MANILA - Philippine President Gloria Arroyo has asked Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad for help in regulating the massive repatriation of illegal Filipino workers in Sabah, officials said Tuesday.

Arroyo made the request in a meeting with a Malaysian delegation led by Bernard Giluk Dompok, minister in Mahathir's department, officials said.

Press Undersecretary Roberto Capco remarked that during the meeting, Arroyo ( photo ) said her government was "hoping there would be humane treatment of Filipinos being deported from Sabah," even as she expressed her concern about the bulk deportations Filipinos.

Large numbers of Filipinos who were living in Malaysia have been deported in recent weeks after Kuala Lumpur imposed tough laws where anyone found guilty of illegal entry or harboring illegal immigrants faced a mandatory six months in jail and up to six strokes of the cane.

The Malaysian government has denied allegations that Filipinos were being abused as they are being deported on ships that carry them across the two countries' martime border to the southern Philippines.